


one look and you're hypnotized

by buckgaybarnes



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Between Movies, Casual Sex, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018) Compliant, Past Relationship(s), Pining, a bit....tonally different from my usual shtick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-03-29 13:46:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19021180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/buckgaybarnes/pseuds/buckgaybarnes
Summary: Hermann is coping.(or: hermann hooks up with the guy who plays newt in an in-universe biopic about the war)





	one look and you're hypnotized

**Author's Note:**

> last summer when i was joking around about the eventual in-universe pac rim biopic on tumblr with a friend i also thought "but what if they actually made a serious one", and that made me go "pru newt hooks up with the guy that played hermann in it", and then "pru hermann hooks up with the guy that played *newt* in it". i started writing the latter concept last august and now here we are
> 
> anyway this was originally going to be a longer fic but it made me deeply sad to write so i stopped where it is. take it

Hermann is coping.

He is—he is really, truly coping. It’s been nearly seven years since Newton left—left without a single word, nearly without a single explanation— and Hermann doesn’t think about it. He doesn’t dwell. He’s out here tonight for a good time: the seventh anniversary of the collapse of the Breach, because life goes on, Hermann’s life went on, Hermann’s coping.

“Another one,” he tells the bartender miserably, sliding his empty cocktail glass back across the bar. “Please.”

Hermann’s coping by spending his night like he’s spent every anniversary of the Breach closing, every birthday, every single one of Newton’s birthdays, and what used to be their own _private_ anniversary since 2025: drowning his sorrows at his favorite gay bar, flipping through old photographs of Newton on his mobile phone, and scoping out even the most _mildly_ attractive short, scruffy brunet in glasses to take home for the night.

The bartender slides him another drink. Hermann locks his phone to take it and nods his thanks. It’s exactly to his liking. He’s a regular here, at this point (he's greeted at the door with _hi, Dr. Gottlieb_!s every time, occasionally finds that his bill has been discounted from what he's sure it should be), so he supposes he shouldn’t be surprised.

The brunet on the seat next to Hermann has been eyeing Hermann up since Hermann’s second cocktail. He’s opened a tab, after all—may as well use it. Normally, Hermann would have determined whether or not the man is someone he wishes to pursue by this point, but it’s—evidently—ABBA night at the club, and it’s just adding to his misery. Newton used to love ABBA; he was always playing it, and singing along to it, in the laboratory. (Sometimes, the speakers declare, when I’m lonely, I sit and think about him…)

“Hi,” the man finally says, loud enough to be heard over the music. His voice is scratchy and a bit high, like Newton’s; it instantly catches Hermann’s attention. The man himself is familiar, too, Hermann realizes when he twists to face him fully, but he can’t place from where. Short. Brown hair. No glasses (and Hermann kicks himself for wishing for it), but he’s got green eyes, a bit of a five-o-clock shadow. Newton-esque. Hermann’s unfortunate type. “Sorry, I don’t wanna be annoying or anything, but—are you Hermann Gottlieb?”

“Yes,” Hermann says. The man’s eyes widen a bit. God, Hermann thinks, here we go, the questions, the flattery, the _how’s the other one, these days, do you still talk to him_ , the obvious prying to find out if the rumors regurgitated by online news sources about the nature of the relationship between the scientific duo who saved the world are true. It’s easier for Hermann to find men who are interested these days—Hermann’s made his homosexuality no secret in the sparse interviews he's done, and there plenty of starry-eyed, fresh-faced scientists trailing after his heels for even the slightest bit of attention from a _rock star_ mathematician such as himself, as Newton might’ve teased—but there is a certain tiring element to it. For once he’d like one of them to call him a sham or a grumpy old bastard or poke holes in his research or accuse him of incompetence. Anything that Newton might’ve done (and done with affection).

The man doesn’t do any of those things. He scoots his stool closer. “Sorry, sorry,” he says, “I—I’m Felix. I played your partner in the, uh, biopic.”

Hermann startles. No _wonder_ the man looks familiar. “Oh!”

The biopic in question came out a year or so prior, detailing the events of the last days of the war. It was fairly accurate. It was well-cast. Hermann remembers being particularly struck by Newton’s actor, who managed to capture Newton’s mania, his intellect, his smile—his smile he’s turning on Hermann right now, with effects that Hermann had not expected (breath catching, heart skipping a single beat). “Oh,” Hermann repeats. “Of course. Yes. Your performance was _very_ impressive.”

“You saw it?” Felix says, clearly awed.

Hermann nods. He did indeed see the film—the first screening, in fact, by special invitation—but for no other reason than that he hoped Newton would also be in attendance. Newton was not. Hermann spent a good deal of the film gazing at the empty seat next to him where Newton’s name placard was set and could not conceive of rewatching it after that. “Only the once, I’m afraid, but you were certainly—memorable.” He smiles, more sadly than he intended, and before he can help himself adds “You made a wonderful Newton.”

(He captured Newton’s smile, and he captured the way Newton used to look at Hermann when they weren’t arguing, when it was just the two of them in each other’s beds or arms trading kisses and promises. He and the young man who played Hermann—Swedish, virtually no acting credits to his name save for a French-language drama about Turing—played off each other marvelously and left Hermann with the strangest blend of nostalgia, misery, and _jealousy_.)

Felix’s eyebrows jump a fraction. Perhaps Hermann was a touch too transparent. (Then again, he thinks, he _is_ currently scrolling through Newton’s abandoned Instagram as he cries into a neon pink martini. That’s already fairly transparent.) “I don’t wanna—”  Felix begins, then glances around and leans in. “Are you and Dr. Geiszler…?”

Hermann stirs the small plastic sword speared with mango around in his drink.

“I only ask,” Felix adds, hurriedly, “because I always thought—all those magazines—well, it was sort of the angle I took, in acting. For your relationship. More emotional depth to the characters, you know?” He winces. “Oh, God, sorry. Not characters. Person. People. You.” He drags his hands down his face. “I’m totally fucking this all up.”

Newton’s smile, and Newton’s charming ability to stick his foot in his mouth in any and all social settings. Hermann clears his throat.

 

Felix is polite, and enthusiastic at the prospect of going home with someone he _idolizes_ , and Hermann decides he likes him, even if he is overly cautious about Hermann’s leg. (“It’s not going to bloody _shatter_ if you touch it,” Hermann hissed when Felix knocked his right knee against Hermann’s left as they kissed and subsequently panicked.) He brought condoms with him, too, so Hermann doesn’t even have to dip into his own small supply. Felix’s equally enthusiastic in bed and does most of the work (just like Newton)—he makes all the right noises, moves in all the right ways, stops every few minutes to make sure Hermann’s having a good time. Polite. Courteous.

With the lights dimmed and his face cast in shadows, he could be Newton. His cries are not as high as Newton’s were, no glasses slip down the sweat-slicked curve of his nose, and his arms and chest are devoid of ink, but his sides are just as soft when Hermann squeezes them, and if Hermann squints, if he pretends, if he remembers (Newton, kissing him, Newton, touching him, Newton, telling Hermann he loves him) it’s enough. “Newton,” he breathes before he can help himself, and Felix stills atop him. Hermann’s cheeks heat in embarrassment; his eyes sting. “I’m sorry—” he says, pathetic even to his own ears, “I—”

“It’s okay,” Felix says, quietly. He doesn’t sound angry. “Go ahead.”

Felix waits until Hermann shuts his eyes to brace his hands on Hermann’s chest and begin to move again, and he doesn’t stop until Hermann (eyes wet) comes and sighs out Newton’s name one last time.

 

“Did he leave you?” Felix asks.

They lay side by side in Hermann’s bed, Felix propped up on his elbow so he can stare at Hermann. Hermann’s shut off his bedroom lights and told Felix he can stay the night, rather than worry about calling a ride home, since it’s cold and miserable out and Hermann could do with the company (or perhaps just someone to hold onto him). Hermann drums his fingers atop his bedspread. “I suppose,” he says. “He was just—gone, one day. Never answered my calls. He emailed me after two weeks to say it was over and that he’d taken a new job.” A short little message, professional and curt to the point of cruelty: they weren’t compatible. The spark they’d had during the war had finally fizzled out. All Hermann’s talk of matrimony (whispered in Newton’s ear the night after the apocalypse that wasn’t) made Newton realize they wanted Different Things. He wishes Hermann all the best!

Hermann deleted within the hour. He regrets doing so now—perhaps there was something he’d misread, some clue as to what he could do to make amends. It would’ve have mattered, he supposes. Newton never answered his calls after that either. “I read about him in articles from time to time,” Hermann continues, with a wry smile. “He seems to be doing just fine without me. Head of research and development over at the _very_ prestigious Shao Industries.”

It’s nice, to get this off his chest. No one ever asks the right questions about Newton.

But Felix is frowning at him. “He’s an idiot,” he says.

Hermann’s immediate reaction—his gut instinct—is to _defend Newton_ , to rise to his honor, to snap at Felix to mind himself (that he doesn’t know what he’s saying), but he shuts his mouth to keep himself from saying anything he’ll regret. Felix means well, he reminds himself. And it’s not as if Newton is blameless. “He’s _not_ an idiot,” Hermann says. “He’s just…” Hermann’s not sure what.

Felix’s phone going off saves him from having to continue. “Sorry,” he sighs, and he turns over to the small bedside table to tap at it.

Hermann’s feigning sleep by the time Felix finishes texting.

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr at hermannsthumb, twitter at hermanngaylieb!


End file.
